No Shows

There’s nothing worse than being left hanging…

There are few things more offensive you can do to a therapist than not show up for your appointment. When your day has been scheduled around that appointment and you’re left hanging, without even a cancellation phone call, it’s pretty easy to get annoyed.

Do you know how much client no shows are costing your massage practice each year?

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if a client doesn’t follow through on their appointment booking, you lose out, big time.

To fix the problem, you must first understand it. Keep a non-returning client report to find out exactly how much revenue absentee clients are costing you. Can you see any common trends? Maybe clients are bailing on just one particular therapist? Or at a particular time or day? If you can spot a pattern, you’ll have a much better chance of finding and fixing any underlying issues and ensure clients show up.

So how do you handle it when clients don’t show up?

• Address your own feelings. Are you irritated? Worried about the lack of income or a dwindling client base? Recognise that these are your own feelings and do not let them enter into communications with the client, no matter how hard that may be.
• Don’t take it personally. No shows are often more to do with what is going on with our client than about us or anything we did or didn’t do.
• Reach out empathically. The purpose is to let clients know you’re available to them, not to chastise them. Leave the door open for them to return back for treatment. A phone call is more personal, but if you hear nothing back, follow up with an email a week or so later. After that, take a hint and know you have done your best and given an invitation for them to return for a treatment when they are ready.

What can you do to minimise no shows?

1. Have a cancellation policy. Your no show and cancellation policy should be written down and available for all to see. That includes you, your team, and your clients. Have it as part of your client intake form, display it on your reception desk. It should live in a link on your website. And, it should be verbally recited to your clients at the time of their time of booking.
2. Consider a booking system. There are a number of payment gateway booking systems available so clients either have to pay a deposit or pay in full at the time of booking. When their money is on the line, the chances of them not showing for their pre-paid service are slim to none. Funny how that works, isn’t it?
3. Watch the clock. Respect is a two-way street. If you expect your clients to show up on time, they need to see the same courtesy from you. Ensure you stick to a schedule and rarely run over time. A client that has to wait past their booked time will be much less likely to return, especially if it’s their first visit. First impressions are everything. If you do run over time (and it’s OK if you do occasionally – you’re only human!) make sure you apologise to the client and reassure them that it’s not a common occurrence. That way they’ll walk away with no hard feelings.
4. Send appointment reminders. Your clients are busy bees – they’re not going to remember every appointment, social soiree, or parental duty in their calendar. If you want to reduce the chances of them forgetting about their appointment, set up an automatic reminder to send at least 48 hours before their appointment. This way you can rocket back to the top of their mind. If they do need to reschedule or cancel, at least you’ll have a little window of time to offer their place to someone else.
5. Follow-up with clients. The last thing you can do to reduce no-shows is follow up with them after their missed appointment. Call them, text them, email them – whatever works for you. Just touch base with them. If you choose to call them, ask politely why they couldn’t make the appointment. If you’re sending them a message, a quick ‘sorry we missed you’ and a prompt to rebook should do the trick. If they rebook and don’t show again (rude!), it might be best to just let them go.

This approach is no guarantee a client won’t drop out of treatment suddenly and without an explanation, but encouraging open communication along the way may help reduce attrition.

Some clients might feel sheepish about returning to a therapist once they no-show an appointment, that’s why it’s important to try and touch base with them in a caring manner as you don’t want to lose a potentially long term lovely client to one mishap.

Despite all of our best efforts, sometimes you just have to make peace with the fact that you may never know why someone doesn’t show up but as least you’ll know you’ve done all you can to safeguard your business.